Against the LC Practice of Prophesying

[Dave]

Originally Posted by Freedom

My experience was always a mix of the good and the bad, and even as a kid I saw some of the bad in the LC. Over time, the bad started progressively more apparent. As I reached adulthood, I had opportunities to take my own initiative with participating in LC activities. Some of this resulted in positive experiences along the way. I can disregard those experiences, but neither do I expect they could ever be repeated again in the LC.

When I was younger and took the initiative to attend conferences and trainings, I don't see that as a bad thing, I just didn't know any better. I wouldn't do it now. The way I try to look at it is that there are much worse things I could have been doing.

Where I think the line has to be drawn is to realize those experiences were something of the past. Whatever the benefit was, I think it's like Igzy said, I tried to "draw near to God". Now that I know better, attempting to stay immersed in the LC environment is not something that God will honor. I also realize I still have a lot of "unlearning" that needs to take place.

The "unlearning" is an absolute necessity. This thread is an interesting train of thought. As I have stated elsewhere my experience in Santa Cruz was the highlight of my Christian LC experience. Detroit, Ft. Lauderdale and Miami were disasters because they were too controlled by Anaheim. In S.C. we had the benefit of being part of the Local Churches but not controlled by them. Of course, Karl Hammond was the buffer and we did experience exponential growth from when Karl and I began in the spring of 1969 until I left in 1971. Growth in numbers, especially young people with their enthusiasm, is its own exhilarating experience. I am seeing that now in my own church, and I'm Unitarian, but it is different because in S.C. it was a hippie hang out with the University of Santa Cruz nearby. In our church it is young families who are coming in with their children and their enthusiasm. The difference is palatable and I would rather have the experience which I have now then what I had then. It was great at the time but it was short lived in the scheme of things. Of course, I was much younger in S.C. and more easily influenced. At our church now we have a remarkable Sunday School and parents tell me their children are insisting they attend.

To me, nature is the real high experience of knowing God. First of all, I know it's real. I don't have to have "faith". When I walk along the ocean which I often do the waves of the ocean speak to me. Even when there are high winds and the ocean is rough it is speaking words of wisdom of how we are fortunate to be here because nature allows it to be. When the ocean is calm I understand peace. High in the mountan of Azungate in Southern Peru I could see the beauty we are fortunate to behold. Hiking the Inca trail to Macchu Picchu gave me the same incredible experience. A similar experience only in complete contrast happened when I hiked down the Grand Canyon with my wife and looked up rather than down as I had in Peru. These are exhilarating experiences and they are real. Nature with all of its foibles is real. I experience God in nature.

Recently my wife and I traveled to the inside passage in Alaska and we rented a 100 foot yacht with 6 other people with a captain and 2 crew. We fished, kayaked and hiked and followed serial breaching humback whales and orcas but we also came upon maybe 100+ humpback whales who were feeding on krill one evening. We anchored and listened to them feeding all night. They surrounded our boat, dove underneath and we could see them feeding in the distance with the sun going down and woke up with them as the sun rose. These experiences in nature are real but they lead to other experiences in our life based on our own real experiences. I am reluctant to start basing my God experiences on something other than what I know to be true in real life. Gravity is real. Am I going to start believing that experiences which violate gravity are real unless they are superficially designed to do so? It's not that they can't be real it is just that they are unlikely to be real.

Tourists travel the world around but it doesn't make them necessarily appreciate God in nature (they might just like the food onboard). It helps if our experiences of nature are intentional but of course people sometimes encounter unforetold experiences of nature. People have experiences which they believe are God experiences which have nothing to do directly with nature e.g. they read a scripture and it speaks to them. However, we attribute this to God because we don't understand it otherwise or we can't tie these scriptures to something directly. Maybe you could pray-read parts of a book by William James or C.S. Lewis or Socrates and it might speak to you.

In any case, I don't think Igzy is delusional nor was I but we have to take a measured response to our "God" experiences with some perspective. I have used nature as one measure of experiencing something real. I could also use the love between my wife and I and our great experiences together. She is a real person and our love for each other is real. Don't base your love between your wife and yourself on something that is unreal--it will never work. To get back to the thread, appreciate the experiences and don't necessarily question them but consider them as part of our life experiences in the LC and move on.

[Freedom]

Originally Posted by Dave

To me, nature is the real high experience of knowing God. First of all, I know it's real. I don't have to have "faith". When I walk along the ocean which I often do the waves of the ocean speak to me. Even when there are high winds and the ocean is rough it is speaking words of wisdom of how we are fortunate to be here because nature allows it to be. When the ocean is calm I understand peace. High in the mountan of Azungate in Southern Peru I could see the beauty we are fortunate to behold. Hiking the Inca trail to Macchu Picchu gave me the same incredible experience. A similar experience only in complete contrast happened when I hiked down the Grand Canyon with my wife and looked up rather than down as I had in Peru. These are exhilarating experiences and they are real. Nature with all of its foibles is real. I experience God in nature.

Recently my wife and I traveled to the inside passage in Alaska and we rented a 100 foot yacht with 6 other people with a captain and 2 crew. We fished, kayaked and hiked and followed serial breaching humback whales and orcas but we also came upon maybe 100+ humpback whales who were feeding on krill one evening. We anchored and listened to them feeding all night. They surrounded our boat, dove underneath and we could see them feeding in the distance with the sun going down and woke up with them as the sun rose. These experiences in nature are real but they lead to other experiences in our life based on our own real experiences. I am reluctant to start basing my God experiences on something other than what I know to be true in real life. Gravity is real. Am I going to start believing that experiences which violate gravity are real unless they are superficially designed to do so? It's not that they can't be real it is just that they are unlikely to be real.

Tourists travel the world around but it doesn't make them necessarily appreciate God in nature (they might just like the food onboard). It helps if our experiences of nature are intentional but of course people sometimes encounter unforetold experiences of nature. People have experiences which they believe are God experiences which have nothing to do directly with nature e.g. they read a scripture and it speaks to them. However, we attribute this to God because we don't understand it otherwise or we can't tie these scriptures to something directly. Maybe you could pray-read parts of a book by William James or C.S. Lewis or Socrates and it might speak to you.

In any case, I don't think Igzy is delusional nor was I but we have to take a measured response to our "God" experiences with some perspective. I have used nature as one measure of experiencing something real. I could also use the love between my wife and I and our great experiences together. She is a real person and our love for each other is real. Don't base your love between your wife and yourself on something that is unreal--it will never work. To get back to the thread, appreciate the experiences and don't necessarily question them but consider them as part of our life experiences in the LC and move on.

I really don't know how "natural" our experiences of God need to be, but what I can say with confidence is that the LC is completely unbalanced and at the opposite end of the spectrum. I see two issues. The first is the tendency to add some hidden meaning to certain experiences of God. The second issue is the pursuit of spiritual experiences that don't exist... I'm still waiting to see the vision of "God's Economy".

I think the value of appreciating nature is that it's something normal and is in contrast to the hyper-spirituality of the LC. I don't think that all experiences of God have to happen in a "spiritual" way. I can say that I've developed a much greater appretiation for the natural world than I did before. Perhaps the years of living in a fantasy world is responsible for that.